Assistant Professor

English

Government Post Graduate College

 Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India 

The beginning of the new millennium i.e. 2001 witnessed the emergence of a new India – a nation that was gaining economic and cultural recognition in the international arena. The booming demographic dividend of India – skilled and non-skilled acted as an incentive for multinational companies to set up their offices in big cities in India. There was a percolation of the knowledge of the English language to the lower sections of society that led to significant changes in the publishing industry also. This chapter is an attempt to understand the evolution of Indian Writing in English in the 21^st century to ascertain whether IWE is freed of its postcolonial hangover. And eventually to explore what the ‘New India’ is writing and for whom?

Keywords: Post-millennial, Indian Writing in English, Commercial Fiction, Twenty-first Century, Postcolonialism.

India since the assimilation of the English language into her culture has produced writers par excellence. The Indian writers mimicked, experimented, and modified the English language until they attained mastery over it and infused the quintessential Indianness to nativize the English language. The British had included English in the school curriculum in India for their benefit but the tool of the master ironically became instrumental in dismantling its rule. The postcolonial critic Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak theorizes such a reception as a kind of “negotiation with the structures of violence” (Spivak 101). This would imply a space in which imperialism did not work its power absolutely or uniformly upon Indians for the exclusive benefit of the British.

Peter Barry while explaining Postcolonial criticism in Beginning Theory points out that all postcolonial literatures are characterized by double identity and ambivalence because of their cross-cultural nature. He has further pointed out that all postcolonial literature can be divided into three phases -Adopt, Adapt, and Adept (Barry 112). The English writings ‘in and on’ India which were initially termed as Indo–-Anglian and Anglo-Indian writings in their initial phase went through various stages to evolve into Indian Writings in English (IWE) emphasizing the Indianness of this body of literature.

This chapter is an attempt to understand the evolution of Indian Writing in English in the 21^st century to ascertain whether IWE is freed of its postcolonial hangover? And eventually to explore what the ‘New India’ is writing and for whom?

Postmillennial India

The beginning of the new millennium i.e. 2001 witnessed the emergence of a new India – a nation that was gaining economic and cultural recognition in the international arena. The booming demographic dividend of India – skilled and non-skilled acted as an incentive for multinational companies to set up their offices in big cities in India. This generated employment opportunities for the youth (lower and middle class) of our country. The metro cities in the early years of the 21st century witnessed an influx of youngsters from all over the country. Moreover, the employment opportunities in the services and software industries run by MNCs require good English-speaking skills. Thus, English-speaking coaching centers cropped up in every nook and corner of the country. A generation of children was raised that understood the importance of the knowledge of the English language for employment and social ascendancy. This percolation of the knowledge of the English level to the lower sections of society led to significant changes in the publishing industry also.

Taking over the English language

The demographic of India in the new millennium was composed of a burgeoning population of English-speaking youth. The nativisation of the English language had started in the hands of great writers before independence like Raja Rao(1908-2006), Mulk Raj Anand(1905-2004), and R.K. Narayan(1906-2000). The process reached its pinnacle with the expanding sphere of English speakers in India who were not the high lords of grammar but the middle class translating and incorporating the Indian syntax, cadence, vocabulary, and nuances into the English language transforming it into a new form - Hinglish. A form of English, free of the colonial strictures, adapted to Indian culture and phonics. This nativized form of English was picked up by the writers of commercial fiction. Nagesh Rao in his semantic study of Chetan Bhagat’s books has pointed out that in colonial history the knowledge of English has been used by the upper-caste men in service of the empire to consolidate their patriarchal and caste dominance. English in the hands of Chetan Bhagat becomes an instrument to break this hegemony and empower the subaltern groups (Rao). The Indian commercial fiction in English was finally able to kick the proverbial stool and stand tall on its own two feet.

Transformation of the Publication Industry

The publication industry in India underwent tremendous changes to benefit from the linguistic evolution in India. The Indian publishing industry had been a remnant of our colonized past. It was more of a British publishing industry that happened to be based in India - a group that was highly Westernised, highly anglicized, and not really rooted in India at all. And this was reflected in the books they published. It was the presentation of Indian exotica to a Westernized audience.

With the publication and subsequent success of the book Five Point Someone by the young novelist Chetan Bhagat, a crisply written romance set at a university in New Delhi in 2004 a transformation in the publishing industry was set apace. Though Bhagat and his contemporaries like Amish Tripathi still found it difficult to secure a publisher for their books consistent popularity and revenue generation of these books made the publishers recognize the potential of home-grown fiction in English. Tripathi shares his experience in an article in Financial Times (2015) “I was told publishing was a fractious industry but on my book there was unanimity. Every publisher hated it,”. After 20 rejections, he decided to self-publish. Enthusiastic word-of-mouth reviews and strong early sales eventually won a mainstream deal. By the end of the first decade of the 21^st century in India, all the major publication houses like Macmillan, Hachette, HarperCollins, and Penguin had their dedicated divisions for commercial fiction (https://www.ft.com/content/32dbf05e-a7c9-11e4-8e78-00144feab7de). Many Indian publishing houses such as Aleph, Speaking Tiger, and many more also cropped up to promote homegrown literature.

Diversified writings for targeted readers

Initially, commercial literature was limited to the genres of romance, campus literature and chicklit. Riding on the success of such books the publication houses became more open to varied forms of writing. Commercial fiction in 10 years has subsumed most of the Indian fiction shelves in bookstores and offers a wide choice to reading such as detective novels, science fiction, historical fiction, mythological sagas, momlit, and so on.

Mythological fiction with its elements of supernatural and heroism is one of the most popular forms of popular fiction. Amish Tripathi’s Shiva trilogy, the first part of which was published in 2010 has sold 2.2 m copies, making it the fastest-selling series in the country’s publishing history (https://www.ft.com/content/32dbf05e-a7c9-11e4-8e78-00144feab7de). Since then, many promising books in the genre have been published such as The Palace of Illusions: A Novel a 2008 novel by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Asura: Tale of the Vanquished is the first novel of Anand Neelakantan 2012, The Pregnant King by Devdutt Pattnaik, Manthan: Chronicles of Kalki by Utkarsh Pandey and many more.

Another rising genre is crime thriller or detective novels. Many new writers have shown promise in this genre. Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line is one of the most highly praised novels of recent years. It’s the fiction debut of Deepa Anappara, an Indian journalist. Anappara deftly relates a horrific tale of child abductions in a New Delhi slum by telling it through the voices of children. The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken by Tarquin Hall is another critically acclaimed and entertaining thriller. On one level, The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken is a simple mystery story about “India’s #1 private detective.” The writer has very deftly interwoven three subplots to keep the readers hooked to the book. The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey is a brilliant mystery novel set in Bombay in 1921. It casts a bright light on the little-known but fascinating Parsi minority in India.

Urban Sagas

One of the reasons for commercial literature being popular was that the stories were not set in distant foreign lands or the past. These stories were set in the urban areas of present India and boasted of characters who were life-like, facing the challenges of transforming India and speaking the language of the masses. These stories were set in the metropolitan cities of India where the youth of the country was residing in hordes because of job obligations.

Another reason for the runaway success of the commercial fiction was also that for the first time, it was specifically targeted toward the youth of the country and propagated what can be termed as the “Indian Dream”. Jeffery Archer, the most successful foreign author in India, puts his success down to the nature of his protagonists. “The Indian race is an aspiring race, and my books so often are about someone coming from nowhere and achieving something, which is what every Indian believes will happen to them – and that’s a wonderful thing.” Amish Tripathi reverberates the similar idea when he claims in the foreword of his book “The Immortals of Meluha”, “What if Lord Shiva was not a figment of a rich imagination, but a person of flesh and blood? Like you and me. A man who rose to become godlike because of his karma.” Therefore we find a large number of the protagonists of these books hailing from smaller cities working in MNCs in the metros far away from their families. This genre of popular or commercial fiction can very well be termed as IIT/IIM folklore where the “dork” emerges victorious in the end through his intelligence and shrewdness.

Social Realism  

The commercial fiction hit a nerve with the young generation of our country because the plot would be generally set in contemporary India and presented characters that seemed to be very real. For instance, the novel Five Point Someone published in 2004 is set in the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi and portrays the fears and challenges faced by the students through the struggles of the main characters - Hari, Alok Gupta, and Ryan Oberoi. The novel 2 States published in 2009 sheds light on social problems related to marriage such as low acceptance of inter-caste and love marriage in our society. Many books written by writers such as Madhuri Bannerjee, and Advaita Kala which were termed chick lit focused on the problems faced by young working women especially finding a suitable life partner, and living alone in big cities. The heroines in these novels are not housewives trapped in the drudgery of domestic chores. The heroines are working independent women who like to shop, travel, eat, and gossip and their quest is to find a life partner who honors their individuality and ambitions.

The post-millennial Indian writing in English has emerged as a genre of writing that has broken the bondage of postcolonial sensibility. The commercial fiction represents Indian writing by the Indians, for the Indians, in an English acclimatized to Indians. Written by the writers born and brought up in India they have churned out stories that are Indian in context, character, and sensibility. The diversified genres in which it has evolved within a very short period are commendable and also symptomatic of the fact that it is yet in its growth phase. The fuelling energy behind this phenomenal growth is the youth of India that is hungry for stories that touch their lives and present the possibility that in the face of robust economic growth and breakdown of social rigidities in the country, nothing is unachievable.

Works Cited

1. “A New Twist to India’s Publishing Boom.” Www.ft.com, 2015, www.ft.com/content/32dbf05e-a7c9-11e4-8e78-00144feab7de. Accessed 2 Apr. 2024.

2. Anand Neelakantan. Asura : Tale of the Vanquished : The Story of Ravana and His People. Mumbai, India, Platinum Press, 2012.

3. Barry, Peter. Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory. 1995. 4th ed., Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2017.

4. Chetan Bhagat. 2 States : The Story of My Marriage. New Delhi, Rupa, 2017.

5.---. Five Point Someone : What Not to Do at IIT, a Novel. New Delhi, Rupa & Co, 2004.

6. Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni. The Palace of Illusions. Anchor, 10 Feb. 2009.

7. Deepa Anappara. Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line. Toronto, Mcclelland & Stewart, 2021.

8. Devdutt Pattanaik. The Pregnant King : A Novel. New Delhi, India, Penguin Books India, 2014.

9. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. In Other Worlds : Essays in Cultural Politics. London, Routledge, 2014.

10. Hall, Tarquin. The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken. Simon and Schuster, 10 July 2012.

11. Massey, Sujata. The Widows of Malabar Hill. Soho Press, 9 Jan. 2018.

12. Rao, Nagesh. “. “The Five-Point Indian: Caste, Masculinity, and English Language in the Paratexts of Chetan Bhagat.” .” Journal of Communication Inquiry , vol. 42, 2018, pp. 113–91, www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-Five-Point-Indian%3A-Caste%2C-Masculinity%2C-and-in-Rao/b462df747e29c6d8db55ddd92f5f46c7ee08fc60. Accessed 12 Jan. 2024.

13. Tripathi, Amish. The Immortals of Meluha. Hachette UK, 20 Dec. 2012.